Inside the hospital ICU I sit next to a stranger, a “John Doe.” He is sleeping, warm, out of the rain. The sliding door to the ICU room slowly opens, and I see a figure of a man I have only read about: the good Samaritan.

* * *

I fumble to open the umbrella as if it doesn’t want to leave the warm comfort of home and enter the cold, ruthless climate. I walk to the hospital. Last week a friend in church asked me why I choose to write about hopeless situations. I was surprised, wondering what his world must look like. I didn’t know what to say. As it goes, I kept coming up with responses I wish I had said after the fact.

I glance at the hospital sign that reads EMERGENCY. These walls speak of the plight of humanity and the need for God in our lives. We all live in a state of emergency; if not for the grace of God and the work of the Holy Spirit, what would be of our day? The human condition has deteriorated so quickly that a constant river of sorrow appears to flow through the streets and corners of silent lives. It is a conscious choice to find the spark, to try to be silent so we can listen, to give in to the desire for action, a call brought to us by the Holy Spirit. I shake my head, thinking that would have been one potential answer for my church friend’s question.

In the background I hear an ambulance approaching the bay, and I hear the sound of a vehicle’s screeching tires coming to a stop several feet away from me. A tall gentleman steps out of the driver’s side of his car and asks for help. A team of nurses and doctors rush outside as I introduce myself to the gentleman, asking protocol questions: Who are you? Do you know the person in the vehicle? It is all so clinical. As I ask, I watch paramedics remove from the back seat an old man with a dirty beard and a dirty, ripped coat, his face and hands scarred and bloody.

Driving home from work, Peter saw what appeared to be a bundle of clothes under a stopsign. People were stepping over it. Peter went on his way, but something did not feel right, so he turned around.

The “bundle” was a homeless man, barely breathing, who had collapsed facefirst on the concrete. The old man’s coat, so soaked from the rain, made it difficult to place him in the back seat of Peter’s car.

Nobody helped Peter.

* * *

A nurse tends to John Doe in the small ICU room. She has cleaned his wounds and tells me he is simply an old man, no illness. There is hope he will survive the night. Just hope.

Three hours and five traumas later, I head toward the chapel. The stained-glass windows have images of the Shepherd. But there, three windows to the right, is an image I have seen many times: the good Samaritan. My mind is clear: “Because as Christians we are asked to step into the spaces of hopelessness and shine a light of hope, to show mercy, to show grace, to share Christ with others.” Thatis the obvious answer to my friend’s question.

* * *

The sliding door to the ICU room door opens, and I see Peter. John Doe sees him and in a raspy breath says, “Thank you.”

I have but a few precious minutes. Dear God, help me. I speak softly and pray with them. As I finish the prayer, the ICU door is open, curtains are drawn aside, and John Doe is taken for transport. The EMT hands me forms to sign, asking, “Will you be a witness here, Chaplain?” I have been, all night. John Doe is going to a private hospital. I see the signature of the doctor, and underneath it Peter’s. He has offered to be the one responsible for all medical charges and care for John Doe!

As I watch them leave, I remember: “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he was attacked by robbers. . . . But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him” (Luke 10:30-33).